December 9, 2022

*) China, Saudi Arabia sign strategic deals as Xi heralds 'new era' Saudi Arabia and China have showcased deepening ties with a series of strategic deals during a visit by President Xi Jinping. King Salman signed a "comprehensive strategic partnership agreement" with Xi, who received a lavish welcome in a country forging new global partnerships beyond the West. News reports estimated that the deals between the two countries are worth as much as $30 billion. *) Moscow frees US basketball star Griner in swap with Russian arms dealer Russia has freed US female basketball star Brittney Griner in a high-level prisoner exchange, with the US releasing Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout. The prisoner swap achieved a top goal for US President Joe Biden, but carried a heavy price — and left behind an American jailed for nearly four years in Russia. Biden said Griner will need time to recover from the "trauma" of imprisonment in Russia. *) Bangladesh's BNP says top opposition leaders taken by police The two top leaders of Bangladesh's main opposition party have been taken from their homes by police a day before a planned rally was to call for the prime minister's resignation. Protests sparked by power cuts and fuel price hikes have erupted across the country in recent months, demanding that Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina step down. Police action comes two days after security forces in the capital Dhaka fired rubber bullets and tear gas into a crowd of thousands of Bangladesh Nationalist Party supporters. *) World's longest-serving president begins sixth term in Equatorial Guinea Equatorial Guinea's long-serving President Teodoro Obiang has been sworn-in for his sixth seven-year term. Obiang said, "As long as I am president and with our resources, the people's desires and needs for well-being will be fully realised." He marked the beginning of his next seven-year term in a ceremony in the capital Malabo which began after a military parade attended by top officials and a host of foreign African leaders. And finall